9.11.1 On the left of the gate named Electran are the ruins of a house where they say Amphitryon came to live when exiled from Tiryns because of the death of Electryon; and the chamber of Alkmene is still plainly to be seen among the ruins. They say that it was built for Amphitryon by Trophonios and Agamedes, and that on it was written the following inscription:

9.11.2 Such was the inscription that the Thebans say was written here. They show also the tomb of the children of Hēraklēs by Megara. Their account of the death of these is in no way different from that in the poems of Panyassis and of Stesichorus of Himera. But the Thebans add that Hēraklēs in his madness was about to kill Amphitryon as well, but before he could do so he was rendered unconscious by the blow of the stone. Athena, they say, threw at him this stone, which they name Chastiser.

9.11.3 Here are portraits of women in relief, but the figures are by this time rather indistinct. The Thebans call them Witches,^* adding that they were sent by Hērā to hinder the birth-pangs of Alkmene. So these kept Alkmene from bringing forth her child. But Historis, the daughter of Teiresias, thought of a trick to deceive the Witches, and she uttered a loud cry of joy in their hearing, that Alkmene had been delivered. So the story goes that the Witches were deceived and went away, and Alkmene brought forth her child.

9.11.4 Here is a sanctuary of Hēraklēs. The image, of white marble, is called Champion, and the Thebans Xenokritos and Eubios were the artists. But the ancient wooden image is thought by the Thebans to be by Daidalos, and the same opinion occurred to me. It was dedicated, they say, by Daidalos himself, as a thank-offering for a benefit. For when he was fleeing from Crete in small vessels which he had made for himself and his son Icarus, he devised for the ships sails, an invention as yet unknown to the men of those times, so as to take advantage of a favorable wind and outsail the oared fleet of Minos. Daidalos himself was saved,

9.11.5 but the ship of Icarus is said to have overturned, as he was a clumsy helmsman. The drowned man was carried ashore by the current to the island, then without a name, that lies off Samos. Hēraklēs came across the body and recognized it, giving it burial where even today a small mound still stands to Icarus on a promontory jutting out into the Aegean. After this Icarus are named both the island and the sea around it.

9.11.6 The carvings on the gables at Thebes are by Praxiteles, and include most of what are called the twelve labors. The slaughter of the Stymphalian birds and the purifying of the land of Elis by Hēraklēs are omitted; in their place is represented the wrestling with Antaios. Thrasyboulos, son of Lykos, and the Athenians who with him put down the tyranny of the Thirty,^* set out from Thebes when they returned to Athens, and therefore they dedicated in the sanctuary of Hēraklēs colossal figures of Athena and Hēraklēs, carved by Alkamenes in relief out of Pentelic marble.

9.11.7 Adjoining the sanctuary of Hēraklēs are a gymnasium and a race-course, both being named after the god. Beyond the Chastiser stone is an altar of Apollo surnamed God of Ashes; it is made out of the ashes of the victims. The customary mode of divination here is from voices, which is used by the Smyrnaeans, to my knowledge, more than by any other Greeks. For at Smyrna also there is a sanctuary of Voices outside the wall and beyond the city.